November 18, 2006

The past week has been a very interesting one for all of us. Yet another merger announcement and the drama that comes with it. I have been attending the AFA-CWA Board of Directors (BOD) meeting in Portland, OR the last nine days and very early in the morning I received a call informing me of the impending merger with Delta Airlines. My first thought was s*&% but my second thought was the challenges ahead given the fact that the flight attendants at Delta are not represented by a union and have no contract. Your MEC and the MEC representing America West were lucky to be together at the BOD with the announcement of the merger. It gave us direct access to the AFA legal and collective bargaining team (I will get to that in a minute). I have seen various emails flying around concerning the many issues of base alignment, seniority, boarding priority and other issues. As with any merger announcement there are concerns about what the future holds and changes that may come. Given the fact that the flight attendants at Delta are unrepresented and the size of the population at Delta in relation to the size of the combined US Airways/America West flight attendant group, there is one important hurdle that we need to get pass and that is representation.

Since the flight attendants at Delta do not have a contract and no representation of a union there are many issues and problems with the announcement of this proposed merger. The first step in protecting your contract and having a voice with management is making sure that AFA is the voice for all the flight attendants. If AFA is not the voice for the combined group (US Airways, America West and Delta), nothing else matters. If you are concerned about seniority and we are not represented by AFA it doesn't matter. If you are concerned about your contract and we are not represented by AFA it doesn't matter. In short your contract would go away if the group is not represented by AFA. In discussions with the US Airways and America West MEC concerning the many issues surrounding this merger, I made the point that collectively we all not to focus our efforts on bringing the Delta flight attendants into AFA. If we don't, none of the other issues matter as we would have no voice. What does that mean? No contract, no control over seniority integration, no say in non-rev boarding priority, no nothing. My commitment to you is that I will be actively involved in bringing the Delta flight attendant into AFA. I also challenged my MEC to be just as active. This is not an issue that we can just sit back and hope happens, we must take charge of the situation. My challenge to you is that I can not do this alone. If it is just me out there and doing all the work it won't happen, I am only one person and we all need to put a face on this and talk to the Delta flight attendants about what is at stake.

In meeting with the legal team of AFA, they spelled out the many challenges and opportunities that this merger presents. It would take the better part of a college semester to talk about all the different directions that this could go in. Rather then schedule a local meeting I will work on putting together a conference call and discuss the issues. With Thanksgiving just around the corner I will more than likely set up the call for the last week of November. The reason for the conference call rather than a local meeting is that it is difficult for most to make it to a meeting and if on a trip you might have some time betweens flights to join in the meeting and get the facts and not the rumors. I will not be publishing the phone and access number for the call since I want to keep it to flight attendants only and not management and the media. If you are interested in participating please send an email to me at alin@afausairways.org. Also send me your cell phone number, if you are on a trip or away from your computer I can send a text message with the information concerning the call.

In the coming weeks and months I will need a team of local flight attendants to help with the Delta organizing issue. This will take all of us staying informed and being involved. If you are a commuter you can also take an active role. Delta flight attendants live all over the country and we will need for you to reach out to them were you live. WE NEED TO FOCUS ON THE FIRST STEP AND THAT IS REPRESENTATION, IF NOT, NOTHING ELSE MATTERS.

Board of Directors Meeting

There were many issues brought up at this years BOD but the most exciting was the election of the International Officers for the next four years. Pat Friend (UAL) was reelected as International President. Veda Shook was elected International Vice President. Veda is the Alaska Airlines MEC President. Kevin Creighan (UAL) was reelected International Secretary/Treasurer. As many of you know I was a candidate for the office of International Vice President. There were four other candidates for the office (Ida Mays (PSA), John Cornelius (Alaska) Diane Tamuk (UAL) Veda Shook (Alaska) and myself). These other four are some of the best and brightest that AFA has to offer and it was a difficult decision for many at the BOD. It wasn't as if it was a choice of good versus evil. To be elected a candidate had to receive more than 50% of the vote. If one candidate did not receive that benchmark then there would be a runoff of the top to vote getters. As the voting began so did the games. Some of the promises that were made did not happen. It is all part of the politics of the union. Some may hate it but being a fan of politics it was fun to watch. Some also took this very personally but for me it was all business and not a reflection on who I am and the job I'm doing. After a long first vote, Veda Shook and Diane Tamuk were the top two in the voting and neither broke the 50% benchmark leading to a runoff. In the final vote Veda Shook was the winner. Veda and I have been friends for many years and I look forward to working with her in her new role. Of course she will soon realize how involved I am at the International Office and the demands I put on the officers.

On a personal note, being a candidate for international office was one of the greatest experiences I have had professionally. It gave me the opportunity to meet with each of the different airlines represented by AFA and directly hear their concerns and issues for their flight attendants. It was an educational process that can not be duplicated. It opened my eyes to the vast issues that each airline must confront. It was also a positive experience all the way around including the voting process. I went into this with a win-win scenario. If I won the office, great. If I did not I would continue to represent a great group of people and what I consider to be the best local at AFA. Either way I could not lose. Also, to be included in the same sentence with the other four candidates was an honor. I have known most of them for over 10 years and know first hand what they bring to the flight attendants they represent and AFA. AFA is a big organization and there is more than enough room for their many talents.

I was elected to serve on the Legislative Policy Committee for AFA. This is a very important committee and one that many want to participate on. I made it very well known that if I was not elected International VP that I wanted to be on this committee. With the results of the election on November 7th, AFA has an opportunity to move our agenda in ways we did not think possible. I will talk about our legislative agenda in the coming days.

Also I would like to thank Steve Schembs (LEC 41 Secretary) for all the hard work he did while I was away. I wanted to take Steve to the meeting to work the back room and lobby for the issues that are important to Council 41 but knew that there would be no one here to meet with flight attendants and deal with their issues. It is nearly impossible to keep up with the phone calls and deal with all the meetings at the BOD. Also with the 3 hour time difference I could not return calls when I usually didn't get done with the business of the BOD until 10 or 11 at night. Thank you Steve for the job you did in my absence.

Ignore the rumors and get the facts. If you have a question about any of these issues please feel free to contact me at 703.212.8090.

In Solidarity,


Alin Boswell
LEC President, DCA
Association of Flight Attendants-CWA